Anorthosite Breccia

Anorthosite Breccia

Exhibition Text

This moon rock is a breccia, meaning it is made from different types of rock that were broken up and then fused together by the pressure and heat of an asteroid impact. Most rocks collected during the Apollo 16 mission in April 1972 were breccias.

This sample is mainly anorthosite, a rock type rich in the mineral feldspar that makes up most of the Moon's ancient highlands. On the early Moon, anorthosite accumulated on the surface of a viscous ocean of magma and remained to form parts of the lunar crust.